Guruvayurappan - Nenmini Unni and King Manavedan

Part 15

Nenmini Unni

Once a Nenmini Namboodiri, a priest at the Guruvayur temple, instructed his 12-year-old son to offer the Naivedyam to the Lord, as he had to go out on an urgent work.

Unni, offered a Naivedyam of cooked rice to the Lord; in his innocence, he believed that the idol would eat the food, but the idol did not move. Unni bought some salted mangoes and curd from a neighborhood vendor, thinking that the Lord would prefer this, mixed the curd with rice and offered it again.

Deity again remained unmoved. Unni requested, cajoled, coaxed and in the end even threatened. Then he started weeping because he believed he had failed and said to the Lord, exclaiming that his father would beat him! The Lord could not bear it anymore and made the Naivedyam disappear. The boy left the temple satisfied.

Unni did not know that the Variyar was the person designated to take the naivedyam offered to the Lord. When Variyar returned to the temple, he saw the empty plate and became very angry with Unni.

But Unni insisted that God had, in fact, eaten the offering. Unni's innocent words made Variyar furious, as he believed the boy had eaten the offering himself and was lying. His father was about to beat Unni, but just then an Ashareeri (celestial voice) was heard saying, "What Unni told is right. I am guilty. Unni is innocent. I ate all the food that he offered me. There's no need to punish him!"

The Nenmini family is still there in Guruvayur and from that day the ritual of offering curd rice and salted mango to Guruvayurappan started. It is brought from that particular illam to which Unni belonged.

King Manavedan

Manavedan of Calicut was born in 1595 and had early education in Sanskrit. Later he became the disciple of Vilwamangalam.

Manavedan told Vilwamangalam about his desire to see Krishna. The next day the Guru told him that Guruvayurappan has given his consent and Manavedan can see Guruvayurappan playing in the early hours of the morning at the platform of the Elanji tree. He could only see and not touch Him though.

When as per this agreement, Manavedan saw Guruvayurappan in the form of little child Sri Krishna, he was so excited that he forgot himself and rushed to embrace little Krishna. Guruvayoorappan immediately disappeared saying, "Vilwamangalam did not tell me that this will happen." However, Manavedan got one peacock feather from the head gear of Bhagavan Krishna.

The peacock feather was incorporated in the headgear for the character of Sri Krishna in the dance drama Krishnanattam, based on Manavedan's own text Krishnageethi which is composed of 8 chapters viz, Avatharam, Kaliya mardanam, Rasa kreeda, Kamsa vadham, Swayamvaram, Bana yuddham, Vivida vadham and Swargarohanam. Krishnanattam is an art form exclusively in praise of and presenting the life story of Lord Krishna. The Krishnanattam began to be staged in the temple regularly as an offering to
Guruvayoorappan. It is performed in the present koothambalam which is located near the sanctum sanctorum of the Guruvayur Temple.

The blessed art form is still maintained by Guruvayur devaswom and staged as an offering by devotees.  Thus, the dance-drama, Krishnanattam, became yet another medium to spread the fame of Guruvayoor all over Kerala.